Events

Shontay Barnes, born and raised in Buffalo, NY, has a deep passion for Western New York. She is a community organizer, having dedicated years to the leadership teams of Black Love Resists in the Rust and Showing Up for Racial Justice Buffalo. She enjoys building deep connections with local groups involved in community care, racial justice, abolition, arts & culture, and recreation.

Professionally, Shontay has a background in program evaluation. After graduating from the University at Buffalo with a Master's in Psychology, she has led several evaluation projects for reentry programs, treatment courts, and youth programs. Shontay places a strong focus on participatory evaluation, engaging organizations in the strategic process of identifying their goals and developing measures of progress. She has a rich history of academic and applied research, as well as qualitative and quantitative data analysis and reporting.

Caitlin Love Crowell joined PPG in August 2023 as a Community Researcher. Prior to this, she worked as a teacher for many years. She is also a longtime community activist and volunteer, particularly in the fields of racial justice, migration, peace, poverty, LGBTQ+ issues, arts, and AIDS.

Currently, her work at PPG focuses on education, arts, housing, police oversight, and the work of the Buffalo Common Council.

Caitlin studied Women's Studies at the University of Buffalo, and her graduate work was done at University of South Florida and Yale University. Her areas of focus were Black women, international feminist activism, and the history of sexuality.

Abstract: Partnership for the Public Good (PPG) is a community-based think tank that builds a more just, sustainable, and culturally vibrant community through action-oriented research, policy development, and civic engagement. Each year, our partners use a democratic process to create a Community Agenda: ways that state and local governments can act to improve Buffalo Niagara in the coming year. PPG then supports the advancement of these advocacy efforts through both individual agenda plank support and collective agenda plank cohort engagement.

Leslie Rupert Herrenkohl, PhD, is the Annemarie Sullivan Palincsar Endowed Professor of the Learning Sciences and Director of the Eileen Lappin Weiser Center for the Learning Sciences at the University of Michigan.

Before joining the University of Michigan in 2018, she worked for 22 years at the University of Washington. Herrenkohl’s research focuses on human learning and pedagogical practice inside and outside of school, particularly in community-engaged science learning contexts. She brings a holistic, critical sociocultural approach to examining how people learn concepts, develop practices and transform their participation in activities that matter to them. As a designer of learning environments, Herrenkohl supports powerful learning that is conceptually rich, personally meaningful and culturally relevant and sustaining. To do this work, she partners with practitioners and community members. These collaborations give her a deep appreciation for relationships as the fertile ground for integrating theory and practice and conducting iterative research to better understand the impact of co-designed approaches and strategies. Her research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the James S. McDonnell Foundation, the Spencer Foundation and the National Library of Medicine.  Her publications appear in Educational Researcher, Cognition & Instruction, Journal of the Learning Sciences, Science Education, Teachers College Record, New Media and Society, among other outlets. She received her Ph.D. in developmental psychology from Clark University in 1995.

Talk Abstract: Signature approaches to research on learning within the learning sciences involve co-design with practitioners and community members. These approaches are complicated, time intensive endeavors that often eschew traditional measures of learning such as pre-post tests in favor of examining learning as it unfolds in interaction and discourse.  Analysis of these data adds extra time and makes dissemination of findings through presentations and publications for research and practice outlets a protracted process. One might ask:  Why bother to engage in these types of partnerships?  This presentation takes up this question to say why partnering with practitioners and community members matters and offers key insights about how to engage in ethical and reciprocal partnerships that make contributions to theory, research, and practice. The presentation ends by discussing how the University of Michigan’s Eileen Lappin Weiser Center for the Learning Sciences, launched in Fall of 2024, centers and supports this kind of generative collaborative work.  

Tamara Clegg, PhD, is a professor in the College of Information at the University of Maryland, where she is the director of the Maryland Computing Catalyst. She also co-directs the Youth eXperience (YX) Lab and has an affiliate position in the Department of Teaching and Learning, Policy and Leadership within the College of Education. She received her Ph.d. from Georgia Tech’s College of Computing and her BS in computer science from North Carolina State University. Tamara’s work focuses on designing technology (e.g., social media, mobile apps, e-textiles, community displays) to support life-relevant STEM learning where learners, particularly those from minoritized, resource-constrained communities, engage in SEM in the context of achieving personally relevant goals. She seeks to understand ways such learning environments and technologies support STEM disposition development and critical data literacies. Tamara’s work has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the Institute of Museum and Library Studies, the Spencer Foundation, Nickelodeon and Google.

Talk Abstract: Participatory design or co-design is a common methodology in technology design particularly for democratizing design for diverse users, especially those who are often historically marginalized or excluded from the design process of the technologies that govern their worlds. Often, in studying participatory/co-design within such contexts, researchers focus on the design insights that come out of them and the methods and techniques used in the sessions (what Bodker, Dindler & Iversen (2017) call the front stage). But this leaves out the critical back stages of these experiences - i.e., the ways they are developed within broader infrastructures and the ways they re-shape and/or integrate into existing systems. Limited studies and understanding of back stage aspects of participatory design obscures impactful structures, practices, routines, and cultures that shape/influence the design process and resulting designs (Bodker, Dindler, & Iversen, 2017). In this talk I will take a “back stage” approach to looking at some of the participatory design (co-design) infrastructures I have been a part of or led over the years. We will look at several vignettes/cases of the processes, partnerships, and infrastructures leading up to and within these participatory design infrastructures. I will highlight key back stage characteristics and aspects of different models of participatory design and some of the impacts they can have on design and the design process. We will close by looking at one of my current co-design projects with NCAA athletes at two Division I Power 5 institutions. I will explore how the all-consuming context of big time collegiate athletics influenced the process of setting up the infrastructure, the resulting infrastructure of participatory design within this context and ways in which participatory design thrives and is constrained within two very different institutions (academia and athletics) within a university.

Raquel Coelho, PhD, holds a joint appointment as Assistant Professor of Emerging Technologies and Learning Sciences at the School of Computing and Information and University of Pittsburgh Research Scientist at the Learning Research and Development Center. Her research focuses on designing and studying learning environments that make the ultra-complex field of quantum information science accessible to K-12 learners, and on designing and studying AI/NLP technologies to support teaching and learning in post-secondary contexts. Raquel's postdoctoral training includes positions at University College London's Knowledge Lab, UK, the Centre for the Science of Learning & Technology (SLATE), University of Bergen, Norway, the Learning Sciences Research Institute (LSRI) at the University of Nottingham, UK, and at the Transformative Learning Technologies Lab, Columbia University, US. She recently became Director of NAPleS (Network of Academic Programs in the Learning Sciences) and is a founding member of the Learning Sciences Brazil Affiliate of the International Society of the Learning Sciences. She received her PhD in Learning Sciences and Technology Design, along with Education Data Science, from Stanford University.

Talk Abstract: Quantum information science, harnessing the strange rules of quantum physics to encode, process, transmit and sense information in radically new ways, promises machines that might be able to solve problems intractable to even our most powerful supercomputers, unhackable communication and powerful sensors. Yet here's the deeper puzzle: quantum phenomena challenge our most basic intuitions about reality. The rules we learn in school turn out to be useful approximations, not the full story. Despite quantum becoming a national education priority, research on K–12 quantum education has been slow to develop, and learning sciences researchers, who have spent decades studying how students understand complex scientific concepts, are largely absent from these conversations. This is striking given that quantum offers a rich domain for understanding how people learn at the boundaries of intuition. In this talk, Coelho will argue that this represents a bidirectional opportunity: quantum education needs learning sciences frameworks like design-based research and theories of conceptual change, while engagement with quantum concepts can advance our understanding of learning itself.

Sara Vogel, PhD, is a born-and-raised Brooklynite, educator, and education researcher focusing on computing-integrated learning environments and forms of teacher education that center bi/multilingual learners, their literacies, and communities. She is currently the Director of the City University of New York – Computing Integrated Teacher Education (CUNY CITE). This grant-funded initiative aims to prepare CUNY's over 13,000 teacher candidates to meaningfully and equitably incorporate computing and digital literacies into their instruction so P-12 learners can thrive in our digital age.

Talk Abstract: Sara Vogel, PhD, will share lessons from Computing Integrated Teacher Education (CITE), an initiative which supports faculty at the City University of New York (CUNY) to revise education courses and programs to equitably and meaningfully integrate computing and digital literacies, with the goal of reaching the 13,000+ Teacher Candidates (TCs) that graduate from CUNY every year, many of whom are or will become New York City teachers. She’ll highlight how research, inquiry, and inclusion have been at the center of CITE’s efforts.”

Jason Yip, PhD, is an associate professor at the Information School and adjunct associate professor in Human Centered Design & Engineering at the University of Washington. His research examines how technologies can support parents and children learning together through co-design, building new technologies and theories, and examining mainstream integrated home technologies (e.g., video games, online searching, generative AI, smart home technologies, etc.). He is the principal /co-investigator on numerous federal grants from the National Science Foundation, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the National Institutes of Health and gifts from Amazon, Google, Mozilla and Duolingo, totaling $18M. Finally, Yip is the recipient of the Jacobs Foundation Early Career Research Fellowship 2020 – 2022 and the National Science Foundation CAREER in 2020.

Yip has earned 19 best paper awards and nominations in top conferences and publication such as ACM SIGCHI, ACM CSCW, ACM DIS, International Conference of the Learning Sciences, International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction, and iConference. He is the winner of two University of Washington teaching awards. He is a senior research fellow at the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop. He holds a B.A. (2001) in chemistry and M.S.Ed (2002) in science and math education from the University of Pennsylvania, and a Ph.D. (2014) in curriculum and instruction from the University of Maryland. His post-doctoral training occurred at the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop (2013 – 2014).

Abstract: In this talk, Yip will focus on participatory design (PD), a design philosophy and methodology focused on democratic collaborations between designers and people. His research focuses on utilizing PD as a way to understand family collaborative learning through building new technologies, investigating home technologies and studying co-design methods. Throughout this talk, Yip will provide examples of how the intersection of PD with theories from the learning sciences and information sciences support how he thinks about collaborative learning with technologies in youth and their families. Finally, Yip will provide a future outlook for how we might consider PD broader within learning and information sciences.

Qingxiao Zheng, PhD, is a postdoctoral associate at the Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Data Science at the University at Buffalo. Her research sits at the intersection of human–computer interaction and the social dimensions of AI, focusing on designing and evaluating AI applications and services that enhance human training and public service delivery. She is interested in how diverse stakeholders collaborate with AI across low- and high-stakes domains, where systems must balance complexity, transparency, and trust to serve both expert and non-expert users. Zheng has published in leading HCI venues such as ACM CHI and CSCW and has served widely across ACM conferences, including CHI, CSCW, DIS, IDC, and IMWUT, where she has been recognized for outstanding service.

Her work has been supported by the NSF, IES, IMLS, and industry partners such as Google.org and IBM–Illinois. She earned her PhD from the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign.

Abstract: At the National AI Institute for Exceptional Education at the University at Buffalo, Zheng's research focuses on designing, developing and evaluating human-centered AI systems that advance special education by extending the reach and effectiveness of speech and language services for children with developmental differences. In this talk, she will discuss how AI can augment expert capacity in both home and school settings—supporting parents in applying evidence-based strategies during everyday interactions with their children, and assisting speech-language pathologists in creating individualized interventions while managing heavy documentation demands. These projects demonstrate how AI can be designed to scale expertise responsibly, preserve empathy and professional judgment, and promote more inclusive and sustainable models of learning experience for all children.

Carrie Allen, PhD, is an associate professor of Learning Sciences at the University of North Texas (UNT). She is a co-director of the Learning Institute - a research institute at UNT that advances interdisciplinary scholarship in the learning sciences and aims to bridge research and practice. Additionally, she is the associate director of the Advanced Environmental Research Institute (AERI), which catalyzes research and outreach connected to human and environmental relationships. Furthermore, she is the Director of Partnerships for the Office of Research Consulting and Texas Research and Evaluation Network for Development (TREND), which supports research-practice partnerships in K-12 education in the North Texas region.

Her work is principally driven by the desire to address inequities within educational systems, with particular attention to socially just and equitable learning designs in STEM education. Through her scholarship, she aims to make visible existing inequalities, develop and utilize designs for equitable learning environments, and foster deep, humanizing relationships that support a revisioning of possibilities for teaching and learning. Guiding this work are perspectives that help theorize how local phenomena are mediated by broader structures, histories and enduring sociocultural practices; the ingenuity and agency of local actors; and designs that facilitate lasting change within teaching and learning. Toward this work, she employs qualitative, design-based and participatory research methodologies in order to design with and for youth and educators, centering their local expertise toward bringing about transformative learning and institutional change. Allen's research has been published in journals such as the "Journal of Learning Sciences," "Journal of Teacher Education," "Journal of Research in Science Teaching," and AERJ.

Xi Lu, PhD, is an assistant professor at the University at Buffalo in the Department of Information Science, jointly with the Computer Science & Engineering Department. She conducts extensive research at the intersection of human-computer interaction and personal informatics, focusing on designing and studying self-tracking technologies that promote health and wellness. Her work extends beyond individual use to explore how socio-cultural contexts shape people’s technology practices and needs. She is particularly interested in stigmatized health domains, such as women’s health and public health crises, where both healthcare systems and the technology industry often marginalize individuals. Her research appears regularly in leading HCI venues—ACM CHI, CSCW, IMWUT, and DIS—and includes a CHI 2025 Best Paper Award. 

Participants explored applications of virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality as a learning tool. 

Jim Slotta, PhD, is a professor and the president's chair in knowledge technologies and education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto.

Talk Abstract: Slotta will review prior work on a model for collective inquiry known as KCI: Knowledge, Community and Inquiry. As a pedagogical model, KCI guides the design of curriculum units that engage the classroom as a learning community, producing a knowledge base and assessable learning outcomes that target specified learning goals.  I will also discuss recent work relating to smart classrooms for learning communities, including a flexible AI infrastructure called the SCripting and ORchestration Environment (SCORE) as well as a new authoring environment called the Intelligent Design Environment for Active Learning (IDEAL).  Together, this work supports a vision for designing and enacting powerful new forms of collective inquiry, leveraging AI in ways that bring students and teachers together as a community.  I will also discuss recent work on a project called the Critical Action Learning Exchange (CALE), which explores the creation of an inquiry curriculum that helps students form identity and gain meaning and purpose in their learning.

Wade Berger, PhD, is a learning sciences researcher whose agenda spans informal learning, community-based partnerships and the infrastructures that shape access to educational opportunity.

Talk Abstract: Berger will introduce community-wide infrastructuring as a framework for studying how hidden systems like transportation, scheduling, relationships and funding shape access to learning across communities. His talk extends theories of infrastructuring to the scale of neighborhoods and cities, showing how these systems influence equity and participation in learning ecosystems. He will share examples and visual models that connect this work to ongoing questions about how we intervene in community-wide ways and work to design learning-centered communities.

Kenneth Joseph, PhD, is an associate professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and the associate director for AI and society at the Institute for AI and Data Science at the University at Buffalo.

Talk Abstract: In this talk, Joseph will share some of his past research and current thinking on how people—both implicitly and explicitly—present themselves and their beliefs on social media. He'll focus on a line of work that examines how individuals construct their identities in Twitter/X bios, how and when people express political beliefs online and what we can (and can't) learn about the complex, dynamic relationship between social identity and political attitudes from social media data.

Sharon Ince, PhD, is the assistant dean for information technology and collection services/associate professor at Seton Hall University Libraries in South Orange, NJ.

Talk Abstract: This talk will discuss research workflows and practices among early-career education scholars. As traditionally libraries held the monopoly on information, the shift in access to information and tools has changed practices. Fragmented tools play a heavy part in piecing together workflows for conducting research, as seamless integrations do not exist. The study examines how early-career scholars are constructing their scholarly workflows and recommends best practices for supporting their workflows. Preliminary answers to these questions will be discussed to help with programming, training, and identifying how academic libraries can support doctoral students and postdoc research work.

Charles Logan is a PhD candidate in the learning sciences program at Northwestern University.

Talk Abstract: As teachers, school administrators and policymakers debate how, if at all, to use generative artificial intelligence platforms like Open AI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini in education, there is wide agreement that young people should learn about AI. In this session, Logan will share findings from a six-week summer program for high school students that explored the ethics of AI in education, police surveillance and social media. His study focuses on an hour-long discussion that features students confronting and contemplating AI’s often obscured ecologies, from the grueling labor required to produce popular tools like ChatGPT to the environmental costs of training and maintaining generative AI. Drawing on a theoretical framework that positions youth as “philosophers of technology,” Logan examines what critical analyses of generative AI the youth constructed, and how conducting this sensemaking about the technology supported youth in describing hopeful and harmful relations between themselves, the technology, other people, and the planet. His findings suggest the importance of expanding the ethical terrain young people traverse when considering what place generative AI may–and may not–have in our collective present and future.

Event Co-Sponsor: University at Buffalo Department of Engineering Education

Talk Abstract: The political conversation has coopted some vocabulary and made it difficult to advance conversations, research and explorations in some hotly contested areas. In this talk, Pérez-Quiñones will present an existing definition of equity in health and draw parallels between HCI design and equitable grading practices. His work on the two seemingly unrelated domains has a foundation of concern for closing the disparities that exist in society through technological interventions. With examples of a study of bilinguals, Dr. Pérez-Quiñones shows how technology design heavily influenced by the ideology of monolingualism creates additional burdens for bilingual users. Armed with data from focus groups as well as personal experiences, he makes the argument that technology is forcing bilingual users to pick a language. This has implications for education, and open communications across language communities, and could create hidden chasms in society.

Melissa McCartney, PhD, is an associate professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University at Buffalo.

Talk Abstract: An abundance of STEM jobs are projected to go unfilled. Researchers have previously investigated demographics and attrition rates for the lack of STEM graduates available to fill vacancies, however, there is potential for additional research examining the impact of career development courses (CDCs). Very little research has been conducted regarding CDCs within undergraduate STEM initiatives. The few studies available link CDCs to retention within STEM majors, however, retention is not the same as entering the workforce. We should not assume that students are progressing toward their intended STEM careers simply because they have persisted in STEM. We may lose qualified STEM graduates because they do not know how to navigate the workforce.

McCartney's lab has developed a questionnaire to examine the impact of student experiences that likely impact career development. The questionnaire measures dependent variables, for example, career goal and strategy development, and student experiences (i.e., independent variables), including participation in research and mentoring experiences. McCartney will present initial results from this large data collection as well as pilot data from our first longitudinal analysis.

Lauren Vogelstein, PhD, is a visiting assistant professor of dance education at Teachers College, Columbia University.

Talk Abstract: This talk centers how embodied theories of learning, informed by the artistic practices of dancers, can reframe what is learned in STEAM spaces and how it can be learned (and analyzed). In particular, this talk looks at how choreographic-based, expansive views of embodied learning can reframe uncertainty as a common feeling in science learning that is often used to discount participation and instead can be generative for ensemble thinking and learning. Across two primary studies, Vogelstein demonstrates how incorporating ensemble-based, choreographic practices into STEM learning environments can expand learners' sensemaking resources (e.g., movement proposals and responses) and support learning by both youth and adult researchers alike. Choreographic inquiry practices offer new ways to support embodied STEM learning that center equitable forms of ensemble participation while broadening the domain-specific conceptual terrain in ways that are generative for the Learning Sciences.

Ari Hock, PhD, is a postdoctoral associate at the Institute for Learning Sciences, University at Buffalo.

Talk Abstract: Addressing the planet’s most urgent socio-ecological challenges requires coordination across individuals, institutions, the built environment, and the natural world. This kind of coordination is complex and involves learning at different scales of practice. In this presentation I describe my dissertation work, which seeks to better understand learning at the scale of the neighborhood, through a collaborative filmmaking project. Residents of a predominantly white, densifying Seattle neighborhood led a series of local walking tours, filmed these tours, and assembled the footage into a documentary film. By theorizing civic learning as a semiotic process, I examine how discourses related to neighborhood and community life inform participants’ modes of expression; and how these modes of expression are laminated into modes of relation over the course of the study. Findings show that discourses of care, accessibility, and groundedness emerge and transform through participants’ ongoing place-storying and infrastructuring efforts. From this analysis, I suggest implications for planners, education researchers, and others interested in creating civic media and designing civic learning environments.

Xintian Tu, PhD, is a postdoctoral associate at the Institute for Learning Sciences, University at Buffalo.

Talk Abstract: With the rapid development of technology, young children now have access to various technologies such as tablets, VR/AR, and AI. More importantly, there remain questions about how we can use such technology to support young children’s learning through interaction in rich sociocultural contexts. Building on Cultural Historically Activity Theory (CHAT) and Learning Embodied Activity Framework (LEAF), my work focuses on designing age-appropriate science learning activities within a Mixed Reality environment. In my presentation, she will first showcase her designs for collective embodied play that facilitate science modeling in MR. Next, I will address the challenges of assessing embodied learning in MR environments through traditional methods. I will share my mixed methods approaches to documenting young learners' collective embodied learning, offering a comprehensive view of their educational experiences.

Heather Killen, PhD, is a postdoctoral associate at the Institute for Learning Sciences, University at Buffalo.

Talk Abstract: Climate change threats are ever increasing, forcing communities to ask: what do they value and how are they going to protect it? Community-based climate education should play a central role in supporting equitable local decisions regarding local responses to climate challenges. However, there is little research about how to best support communities, especially rural communities that may be skeptical of climate change, to see how climate change is affecting their landscapes. Guided by the perspectives and practices of critical data science and story listening, I frame my research around data and story. Prior work has considered the role of climate data within environmental education and story within community scholarship, but there is still a need to explore expanded notions of data within community learning and the role of community-held stories in local decision-making. My work focuses on how local, personally held landscape and climate data might complement and extend local, institutionally held data and how map building might support data-rich storytelling and listening. In this talk I will share my community-based work building a map with six residents of a conservative-leaning, rural community and how collaborative map design supported participants to convene knowledge about local landscape and climate, ratify that knowledge through inclusion onto a public map, and ultimately inform community decision making. I found the collaborative map building process allowed local, often generationally held, climate and landscape knowledge to become community-held understanding, pointing to a pathway for engaging community members in understanding how local and beyond-local socio-cultural values and systems are physically embodied in their local landscapes.

Wendy Barrales, PhD, is an interdisciplinary scholar-activist and postdoctoral associate at New York University's Department of Teaching and Learning.

Talk Abstract: Chicanas and other women of color (WOC) have long centered embodied knowledge and storytelling as a critical part of intergenerational healing and learning. However, these experiences are not typically accounted for and are often invisibilized. Dr. Wendy Barrales, PhD explores what we might learn when we attune, document, and account for intergenerational WOC experiences across time and space. Grounded in arts-based methods and feminista embodied knowledge, this research showcases the creation of the Women of Color Archive (WOCArchive), a digital storytelling project preserving the stories of matriarchs of color. Through an emphasis on the feminist praxis of process over product, Barrales’s purpose is twofold: first, to describe how the digital art pieces and archive were co-created alongside youth and showcased at a public art exhibition; second, to center and celebrate WOC as experts and knowledge producers. Through documenting, preserving and amplifying their stories, Barrales' research attempts to begin giving women of color their flowers. 

Join us as we explore the pivotal role of learning sciences in addressing societal issues. A distinguished panel of experts will discuss the intersection of research, design, and interdisciplinary collaboration in shaping the future of the field.